The State of Minas Gerais, Brazil.

Minas Gerais is the heart of Brazil. No other state is as poetic as Minas. Only the Amazon is more isolated and São Paulo more populous. Minas is a Brazilian giant. It covers 352,000sq. miles, is the fifth largest state in area and has 15 million inhabitants. Minas Gerais is larger than both France and the U.K. combined. Click on photo to go to the official Minas Gerais Government Homepage.

Minas is rugged and isolated. The land of this once heavily wooded province is ragged now. Minas means mines. Everything from gold to diamonds to iron has flowed from its mineral ore veins to the world. Even today, the streets of its quaint, ancient towns are pink with iron ore dust and the rivers red with it. The mineiro is an assiduous preserve r. He has kept the music box churches of his baroque past. The mineiro is both conservative and progressive. While they boast Brazil´s best-preserved colonial towns, they also built the nation´s first planned city, Belo Horizonte. There are hundreds of waterfalls for bathing and huge caves for exploring.